September is a dark month
for two districts;
Columbia,
the financial,
and their addictions

It was the gleam
that amused
makers with means,
and a glow
blinding bundlers
of liens

The incentive
to immerse
in forecast and risk,
taunts hustlers
to develop new tricks

We should burn the casino
and never rebuild,
as the flash
and the stacks
keep the poker room
filled

Take all the dealers,
the bosses
and their kind,
and force a fair hand
with an exchange
to unwind

The games we granted
housed rules
they all wrote,
because we are pawns
with soft views
as we vote

Donkeys, elephants-
they're both on the hunt,
stalking for stakes
in granite jungles
we fund

On the blocks and banks
where legal burglars
bust standards,
customers line tables
as willing fools
and bystanders

As black becomes red
in deals they can’t afford,
numbers are bent
to reconfigure the board

The vice and the sin
stain neighborhoods
as a blight,
while barons and felons
roll the dice
every night

There's a roar
when they hit,
and quiet with mistakes,
knowing this system
is too fixed to break